


Heaven help a fool who falls in love

by taizi



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou | Natsume's Book of Friends
Genre: M/M, a place for me to dump all my tanunatsu drabbles :')
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-03-28 02:15:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 5,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13894101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taizi/pseuds/taizi
Summary: Natsume looks like something out of a folktale, a human-shaped wisp in the shadows of an old shrine, pale and delicate andunfairlypretty.At times like this, Kaname very carefully doesn’t stare.





	1. i think i'm in love with you

**Author's Note:**

> a series of standalone tanunatsu stories ! mostly prompts crossposted from tumblr :)

Kaname isn’t  _usually_ desperately grateful that his father is away for work, but he is now, as someone bangs on the front door with what sounds like a personal vendetta against conventional sleeping hours. 

He yanks the door open, and stares. Natsume stares back at him, his arms curled protectively around an irritated Ponta, shivering in the bitter January night air without a jacket. 

“You just – opened the door?” Natsume says incredulously. “You didn’t even ask who I was. What if I had been a burglar?”

“You wouldn’t have knocked if you were a burglar,” Kaname says, incredulous himself as he reaches out to drag Natsume inside. “What are you thinking? It’s freezing out –  _you’re_ freezing! Get inside, come on.” 

He gathers Natsume in against him, attempting to stave off the winter cold. Natsume leans into him willingly for all of three seconds, and then pushes stubbornly away.

“Wait, I have to – Tanuma, I need to tell you something.”

The legs of his pants are damp, as if he’d gone plowing through snowdrifts to get here, and he’s trembling in the heat of the house. Kaname refuses to hear him out until Natsume agrees to change out of those clothes, not budging even when Natsume looks faintly betrayed by the reasonable demand.  

“There’s no point trying to talk sense to him right now,” Ponta says with a derisive sniff the moment Natsume is out of the room. “He’s drunk.” At the look on Kaname’s face – and it  _must_ have been telling – the cat hastily adds, “It wasn’t me, it was the Shojo he befriended. He helped them with a task, and they gave him a taste of their seawater wine as thanks. They’re a harmless sort, no need to get excited.”

And Kaname trusts him enough to relax, sinking into a seat at the kitchen table. “Shojo?” he asks. 

“They’re a sea spirit.” Ponta hops up into his lap, every bit like a pampered housecat. “They live on secluded beaches, for the most part. Clever creatures, but they drink so much wine it makes them silly. They really do brew the  _best_ wine, though,” he adds, and his clear favor for the Shojo suddenly mankes sense. 

Kaname rubs a hand over his forehead, thankful, somewhere in the back of his mind, that there’s no school in the morning. “Okay, but how does that explain  _this?”_

He doesn’t need to elaborate. Ponta huffs. “Shojo often amalgamate their brews with certain magics. They can create a brink wine that only tastes good to the pure of heart, and I’ve even heard of their wine healing humans close to death. In this case, they thought Natsume would benefit from being less,” he pauses to parse for the appropriate word, “inhibited.”

Kaname stares at him. “Did Natsume ask for that?”

“Does Natsume ever ask for anything in return for his meddling?”

And Kaname feels a faint stirring of anger, like a greasy coil in the pit of his stomach. Natsume gives them kindness, and they give him a drugged drink? His life would be so much easier if he wasn’t so eager to  _help_. 

“The Shojo simply enjoy life,” Ponta says, as though to help him understand. “They thought they would help Natsume enjoy it, too. Natsume’s spiritual power enhanced the qualities they imbued in the wine they gave him, and what should have been a gentle nudge turned into a  _shove_. It should only last the night. He’ll be himself in the morning.”

“Tanuma.” Natsume’s voice draws Kaname’s eyes to where his friend is standing in the doorway in borrowed clothes, as stiff with nerves as he was with cold when he arrived. “Please let me talk to you.” 

Ponta jumps down as Kaname stands and patters into the kitchen. 

“Come sit,” Kaname says patiently, all but aching for his friend and this fit of forced honesty. But Natsume shakes his head and starts pacing, fingers twisting in the sleeves of Kaname’s sweater. The sweater is too big on him, and Kaname wishes it was the appropriate time to find that charming. 

“I can’t,” Natsume starts to say, then stops. “Look,” he tries again, “I know I’m not – “ He jerks to a halt in the middle of the room, eyes bright with frustration. “I don’t know how to say this.”

“You don’t have to say anything.” Kaname would almost rather he didn’t. “Just – come sit down with me? We can heat up something to eat and watch a movie, we don’t have to talk. I’m here for you, no matter what – but I don’t ever want you to think you  _have_ to give me something you don’t really want to.” 

But somehow that’s the wrong thing to say, because the brightness in Natsume’s eyes threatens to spill over and he blurts, “I think I’m in love with you and that scares me half to death.”

With that, Kaname doesn’t think he could find the strength to move if his actual life was on the line. He sits and stares stupidly, while Natsume wrings his hands and looks at the floor. 

“One of these days you were gonna figure it out,” Natsume says without lifting his eyes, “and then you’d – you wouldn’t want to be friends with me anymore. You wouldn’t hate me, I know that – you’re so kind – but you wouldn’t be a part of my life anymore.” He covers his face, digging the heels of his hands into his eyes. “That scares me.”

His voice hitches, and Kaname remembers how to move. He crosses the room in three long strides and wraps firm hands around Natsume’s wrists. 

“Hey, hey, Natsume. Look at me – just breathe, okay?”

His heart would be fluttering if it wasn’t so heavy, he thinks, as he manages to ease Natsume’s hands down. 

“After everything I’ve done to prove I want to be here next to you,” Kaname says, “you think there’s anything you could do to make me walk away?”

Natsume’s expression is so transparent and unguarded that Kaname isn’t sure how he’ll get used to the walls that will go back up the moment the Shojo’s magic is gone.

“Come sit,” Kaname says gently, “and let me make you something to eat. And in the morning, you can take it back, if you want. It’s not fair that a drink made you tell me a secret you wanted to keep. You can take it back and I won’t bring it up again, okay? But let’s wait until morning.” 

For a long moment, Natsume doesn’t move. He searches Kaname’s face as though he’s seeing him for the first time, or trying to commit him to memory. But when Kaname gives a gentle tug on their joined hands, Natsume follows him into the warm light of the kitchen. 

He’s quiet for the rest of the night, and Kaname is quiet with him. 

He does his very best to put his own feelings on the shelf, and ignore the painful surge of joy at Natsume’s stricken confession. If this isn’t what Natsume wants, then Kaname doesn’t want it, either. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the morning Kaname wakes slowly, stirring in the heavy swathes of rich sunlight that paint the living room gold. When he looks up, he’s looking into amber eyes.

Natsume’s stubborn mouth is firm with resolve, and his gaze is steely, and the only thing that gives away his nerves is the tight way his hands are folded in his lap. 

Kaname sits up and considers him. From the far side of the room, Ponta says, “The magic is gone, brat. Don’t worry about taking advantage of him.”

Color burns in Natsume’s face, but he doesn’t budge. The too-big clothes he’s borrowing sit crooked on his willowy frame, and it’s just as charming as it was the night before.

“What if I don’t want to take it back?” he asks quietly, courageously. 

Kaname can’t help the smile that breaks wide across his face, or the warmth that blooms like flowers in his heart. 

Just that must be answer enough — because for the first time since he arrived last night in the dark and cold, Natsume smiles back, bright enough to rival the rest of the sunshine filling the room.


	2. can i hold your hand?

The room is painted orange with dusk, fading sunlight slanting inside past the long white curtains at the window. Nishimura rearranges Natsume’s blanket one more time with a fussy yank before hurrying to the door without looking anyone in the eye, and Kitamoto lingers after him just long to touch Kaname’s shoulder in parting.

“You heard the doctor,” Kitamoto says quietly. “He’ll be fine.”

Kaname nods, and maybe he’s supposed to say something – he should say thank you, at least, probably – but he doesn’t find the words in time and when he looks up the rest of the room is empty. 

He’ll remember to thank them later. 

“Don’t worry,” he says, “the staff won’t make me leave. I have permission to stay with you, since the Fujiwaras are out of town.”

The machinery next to him beeps steadily, keeping time with Natsume’s heart. Kaname thinks he’ll probably hear this sound in his sleep for weeks. 

“Maybe you should have gone with them after all, huh? It would have gotten you away from here, away from whatever’s been hunting you. I know you hate to visit your other relatives, but is this really the better of the two options?”

Natsume was never happier to see his foster parents leave than he was the other day, to see them removed from the dangerous situation they were blind to. But as relieved as he was to wave them goodbye, a part of him looked helplessly young and painfully beseeching as his guardians left him behind, albeit unknowingly, to face this monster alone. 

Whatever manner of creature it was had even Ponta on edge, but Natsume was a nervous wreck these last few days, constantly looking over his shoulder, staring too long at shadows in the corner, not sleeping except in stolen snatches during class. 

“You must have been scared,” Kaname goes on, fingers curling into fists in the fabric of his jeans, “since you came to me for help. I can’t do much, but I’ll do whatever I can for you, always. But I guess that wasn’t enough this time.”

The violent wind Kaname has come to associate with ayakashi tore straight through their wards and wrenched Natsume away, ripped him right out of Kaname’s hands, and Kaname has been hollow with terror every second since. 

Even after they found Natsume miles away, unconscious and with a knot on his forehead the size of Kaname’s fist – even after Ponta and a giant horse-headed yokai that didn’t fit fully inside even the largest seeing circle banished the weakened creature for good – even after the paramedics arrived and assured Kaname that Natsume would be fine, Kaname has been terrified. 

“If,” he starts, the barest whisper, and can barely go on. “If I failed you, I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you, however I can. Whatever you want.”

He doesn’t know what exactly Natsume means to him, but he knows he means a  _lot._ Whatever it is, it’s so much, and it weighs so heavy, and it’s so warm that it sometimes burns. Kaname doesn’t yet have a name for the feeling, but it isn’t one he’s willing to surrender. It isn’t one he’s ready to lose. 

“I’ll do better next time,” he swears in the near-silence of the private little hospital room. “So please – let there be a next time.” 

“Tanuma?” 

Kaname jerks his head up so fast he sees after-images. Natsume is peering at him with heavy-lidded eyes and blinking slowly, as though he’s about to tip back into sleep. 

“Natsume,” he says hoarsely, “are you – how are you feeling? Let me – I’ll call a nurse, hold on – “

“Tanuma,” Natsume says again, soft and dreamy. Kaname has no idea how long he was listening, and it’s obvious that there’s something he wants to say, but heavy medication and exhaustion are pulling him back down before he’ll have the chance to manage the words. 

So he moves, as slowly as if the thin blanket pulled up to his chest is weighted with lead, and finally works an arm free. He can’t lift it more than a few inches off the bed, but it drifts in Kaname’s direction, and Kaname is on his feet, hovering at Natsume’s side, trying to piece together what it is that he wants. 

“Can I hold your hand?” comes the quiet question, and Kaname stares at him. Slowly picks up Natsume’s hand in one of his own, as carefully as he can, and feels Natsume’s fingers wrap around his with as much force as he’s able to scrape together. 

“Don’t let go this time,” he adds, with the faintest of fond smiles.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Kaname says, and even manages to smile back as he wipes the tears out of his eyes with his free hand. 


	3. luck has nothing to do with it

Kaname wakes up with a weight on his shoulder, warm and breathing where it rests against him. It takes almost a full minute for him to breathe through the pang he feels at how familiar this has become.

The clock on his nightstand shows about an hour before Takashi will need to leave for school, and as much as he would like to let him sleep, Kaname also doesn’t want to rush his boyfriend out of the house when he finally decides to drag himself out of bed on his own.

So he shifts, just enough to get a faceful of sleep-tousled hair, and kisses Takashi on the forehead.

“No,” Takashi says at length, and presses closer. Kaname can picture the mighty scowl on his face and smiles.

“I didn’t even say anything.”

“You’re trying to wake me up. No.”

“You’re already awake,” Kaname points out. Takashi doesn’t move, the arm slung around Kaname’s waist only tightening there, and Kaname can’t help but laugh a little. “You’ll have to get up sooner or later. I won’t waste away while you’re gone, I promise.”

Really, with as easily as Takashi gets sick himself, he shouldn’t have come in the first place. But Kaname has recently discovered how nice it is to have company when he’s under the weather. 

Kaname has never had close friends the way he does now – has certainly never had a boyfriend before – but he’s acclimated scarily fast to both. He doesn’t know how he got by before and he certainly doesn’t think he’d do well without, ever again.

And maybe Takashi, of all people, knows that feeling all too well.

Chest tight, Kaname kisses him again. Takashi goes pink but he doesn’t squirm away the way he usually tries to when faced with affection – if anything, he only looks more stubborn, and Kaname decides ruefully that he really isn’t doing a good job in giving Takashi reasons to leave. 

“Come see me again after school,” he finally says. “We can make soup for dinner.”

“You mean  _I’ll_ make soup for dinner while you sit and watch.” Takashi finally begins the process of extracting himself, looking decidedly mutinous about the whole thing. He hesitates, and adds, “I’ll probably have Nishimura with me tonight, at the very least. I can only keep him away for so long, and it’s been two days now. He’s worried, in his own way. He’s stocked up on all kinds of sweets to bring you.”

The earlier pang returns, making itself a home in Kaname’s heart. “I’m lucky to have all of you.”

“I’ve come to find,” Takashi says firmly, brushing the fringe out of Kaname’s eyes with doting fingers, “that luck has  _nothing_ to do with it.”

It’s still another ten minutes before he finally gets up. Kaname listens to him curse at the clock and rush into the next room to change, and smiles deeply against his pillow, where Takashi’s warmth and the smell of his shampoo linger like a ghost.


	4. sucker's bet

Nishimura is  _still_ whining about how far away the vending machine is ten minutes later, and Tanuma, maybe predictably, is the one who ultimately caves in.

“I could use a drink, too,” he says defensively at the incredulous look Atsushi gives him. “Might as well get Nishimura something while I’m there.”

“Exactly,” Nishimura replies, “ _exactly,_ Kitamoto.” 

And because the two of them were talking quietly to one side of the group before the interruption, Natsume stands when Tanuma does and says, “I’ll go with you. What were you saying about your dad?”

“Oh, yeah,” Tanuma says, brightening as Natsume falls into step beside him. “So, for dinner last night we decided to try the recipe that Touko-san gave us, and –  _well,_ neither of us can really cook, so – “

They’re laughing together in a way that makes Atsushi think of his parents, and those late nights that he peeks in at the two of them sitting at the kitchen table in their cramped apartment, alone together and intimately comfortable in the shared space. 

He thinks that’s probably what love looks like, and then promptly feels embarrassed for thinking it.  

“Five hundred yen says they’re holding hands,” Nishimura says without lifting his head off the windowsill. 

“Five hundred yen says they bring you back a can of corn soup instead of milk tea because you forgot to give them change,” Atsushi replies peacefully.

The extended legs of Nishimura’s chair hit the ground with a slam and he squawks, “No way! Tanuma’s too nice, he wouldn’t – “ His mouth settles into a grim line. “Natsume would.”

There’s a pause, in which Atsushi fully expects Nishimura to go shooting off after the other two – but instead he settles back into his chair with a disgruntled air. 

“Soup’s fine I guess,” he mutters. Atsushi blinks at him and looks over. 

Tanuma and Natsume have paused just outside the door to talk to Tsuji, and their fingers are tangled comfortably between them. There’s no self-conscious flush on Natsume’s face, either, no room for anything there but a wide, warm smile. 

And Nishimura, who disrupted their whole lunch break because he was too lazy to walk downstairs to get himself a drink, doesn’t want to interrupt. 

“Shut up,” he says, before Atsushi can open his mouth. “They’re adorable, okay?”

Atsushi grins. “Five hundred yen says they’ll make it official before the end of the month.”

“Sucker’s bet,” Nishimura counters promptly, and leans his chair back again. 


	5. you're stuck with me

“I’m so sorry,” Natsume says for what feels like the twentieth time, every bit as stricken as the first. 

“I have no idea what you’re apologizing for,” Kaname points out dryly, averting his gaze to the door, where rain is coming down in heavy sheets. “You don’t control the weather.”

“I shouldn’t have dragged you out here. You’d be at home right now if I hadn’t called.” 

Kaname counts to ten in his head, and then twenty after that, and  _then_ he can say, with all the patience and kindness his best friend deserves, “I wanted to come with you. I’m glad you called.”

And it would take far more than a summer storm to make Kaname regret spending this afternoon with Natsume. It would take something impossible to make him regret picking up the phone to hear Natsume say, in that quiet, considering way of his, that he wanted Kaname to come with him today. 

At the very least, he thinks into the following silence, we did what we came here to do before the weather took a turn for the worse. Natsume returned a name, and I was here in case he needed me. 

And then the skies opened up and they had to run for the cover of a nearby shrine. That’s where they are now, with Natsume brushing wet fringe out of his face, eyes like green moons beneath cloudy silver hair. 

He looks like something out of a folktale, a human-shaped wisp in the shadows of an old shrine, pale and delicate and  _unfairly_ pretty. At times like this, Kaname very carefully doesn’t stare.

“Really?” Natsume is saying dubiously. “You’re soaking wet, and it doesn’t look like it’s gonna let up any time soon. We could be out here for awhile.” 

“That’s not the nightmare you seem to think it is,” Kaname says plainly. “Given a choice, I’d choose you to be stuck here with any day.”

The surprise telegraphs easily on Natsume’s face, like watercolor bleeding across paper. Kaname counts to ten in his head, so he doesn’t open his mouth and let something too honest come out.

It would take far more than a summer storm to make Kaname regret spending this afternoon with Natsume. It would take something impossible to make Kaname wish himself away. 

And when Natsume finally gives in with grace and gives Kaname a rueful smile – when he shakes his head a little, as though  _Kaname_ is the surreal and wonderful one in the room – it makes Kaname want to say, ‘Don’t you get it? I just want to stay beside you.’ 

He doesn’t, though. Natsume’s smile dries out Kaname’s mouth, makes his heart beat too fast and his hands feel clumsy. He’s brave enough to follow Natsume up a mountain and into the den of a mean ayakashi but he’s not brave enough to say  _that._

What he says instead is, “You’re stuck with me, like it or not.”


	6. feel better

Nishimura throws open the roof access door, loudly announcing, “We’re here!”

Then he bears down on Kaname with a few swift steps and hisses, “ _Make him feel better,”_ without breaking stride or missing a beat. 

Kaname blinks, a bite of rolled egg halfway suspended to his mouth. Beside him, Kitamoto says at length, “What.” 

But Natsume steps out into the sunshine at that point, a few steps behind his lively counterpart, and Kaname promptly drops his lunch. 

One hand is wrapped to the fingertips, and the edge of a second bandage peeks out the neck of his shirt. He has a black eye. He looks fifteen going on fifty, moving as deliberately as if the weight of gravity might be enough to crush him on its own. 

At least he called the night before to warn Kaname he’d run into some trouble, even if a harried Touko in the background made it clear the call had been coerced. Kaname appreciates the warning nonetheless. 

He was braced for bad, even if he wasn’t quite braced for _this_ bad. 

Natsume says, “Hi,” in a tone that suggests it takes more effort than its worth, and Kaname is taken by the sudden urge to touch him. Just to make sure he’s still solid and substantial. To soothe away some of the shadows in that pale face if he can. 

He keeps his hands in his lap. 

Kitamoto is half-standing, hands gravitating forward like he’s ready to catch their friend should he pitch over suddenly. His expression toes a thin line between angry and scared. 

“ _Natsume?_ What _happened_ to you?”

“I’m anemic,” Natsume says tiredly, sitting next to Kaname without lifting his eyes. “I bruise easily. Please don’t worry about it.” 

It’s a tired excuse. It sounds well-rehearsed. Hearing it fills Kaname’s throat with something bitter, and he watches it do literally nothing in the way of assuaging Kitamoto’s worries. 

It isn’t Natsume’s fault. He’s caught up in his grandmother’s legacy, and doing the best he can to live up to it without hurting anyone along the way. It’s a ridiculous burden to shoulder alone, a responsibility a lesser person might not have taken upon themselves. But Natsume is so fierce and so fair, and so stubborn when it comes to everyone’s well-being but his own, that Kaname can’t imagine him giving up on this reckless self-made mission any time soon. 

He doesn’t consider that a bad thing, not entirely. Not anymore. 

On Kitamoto’s opposite side, well out of Natsume’s line of sight, Nishimura gestures viciously at Kaname – clearly a  _“get on with it!”_ if Kaname’s ever seen one. 

Well, if he insists. 

Kaname reaches over to tap lightly on the back of his boyfriend’s bandaged hand, and leans in as Natsume lifts his head. He times it perfectly, catching Natsume with a kiss on the cheek before he has time to telegraph the move and shyly dodge away. 

Color blooms in Natsume’s face, his eyes widening behind the bruises, pretty and lively and remarkably human where a brittle ghost was sitting moments ago. The flush only deepens when Nishimura howls good-naturedly from somewhere to the side of them and Kitamoto mutters something long-suffering in turn.

Kaname grins, and frames Natsume’s face in both hands before he has a chance to escape, and kisses him again, properly this time. 

Natsume is bright red by now, and says in a tone of utmost betrayal, “You’re doing this on _purpose.”_

“Of course I am,” Kaname replies peacefully. He brushes his thumb against an unmarked part of Natsume’s cheek, taken by what the sunlight does to his hair. 

And it takes a moment but it’s worth waiting for, when Natsume softens under his touch and smiles back. 


	7. i want you to be happy

To anyone who doesn’t know him, it would look like fury on Takashi’s face. 

“You keep saying the same thing,” he snaps. His hand are curled into fists to hide their trembling. “‘Whatever you want,’ like it doesn’t matter to you.” 

It must really have been bothering him if he’s willing to pick a fight about it. 

Oddly enough, a part of Kaname is relieved when conflict crops up. A younger Takashi would have swallowed his frustrations and let them build into something ugly and overwhelming – it always took them a lot longer to pick up the pieces after something so long pent-up finally gave. 

Nishimura is behind him, watching with narrow eyes. He knows Takashi better than anyone, but miraculously he’s waiting to see where this conversation will go before leaping in to take sides. 

Looks like they’ve all grown up a little. 

“Don’t you care?” Takashi presses, eyes bright and glittery. 

“Of course I do,” Kaname says. He reaches for him, easing Takashi’s stubborn fists open, folding their fingers together. “It’s just – all of this,” he says, indicating the mess on the table with a nod, “is secondary to me.” 

Takashi looks down at their joined hands, temper relenting a little already. He isn’t given in yet, though, and looks up with a challenging brow raised. “Where we’re going to live and work is secondary to you?”

“Honestly, it is.” Kaname grins at the disbelief on Takashi’s face and tugs him a step closer. “It’s just an apartment. It’s just a job. The most important thing is you.”

Understanding dawns in Takashi’s pretty face, chased by an embarrassed flush. He waffles, and looks down at his feet. “Oh.” 

“But it must have been kind of frustrating, not really getting any input from me, huh? If you want my opinion, I think we should go with the first place you found.” 

“That’s what I said!” Nishimura crows, delighted. “Then me and Acchan would be your neighbors!” 

“I want you to be happy,” Kaname says plainly, meeting Takashi’s eyes. It’s so easy to say it because it’s been the truth for so long. “I don’t care where I go, as long as I go with you.”


	8. good thing i'm here

Somehow, after all his close encounters with volatile yokai and exorcists and curses, Takashi manages to forget there are ordinary dangers to be wary of, too. 

Dangers like getting separated from his friends in an unfamiliar town, and completely losing his way after a few wrong turns, and three large men cornering him on a dead end street. 

He looks at them, and for a moment that he’ll kick himself for in the future, doesn’t even register a threat. They’re  _humans_ , after all, casually dressed and clean-shaven.

They’re humans who, as it turns out, want whatever money Takashi might be carrying. 

“You’re dressed too nice not to have a little  _somethin’,”_ one of them leers, eyeing Takashi’s jacket in a way that suggests he’d be able to accurately guess the resale value within a thousand yen. “A smartphone, maybe. A nice allowance?”

The only thing in Takashi’s bag is the Book, and he doesn’t think they would find a weathered collection of illegible scribbles to be worthwhile. For a moment, he entertains the thought of them stealing it anyway, and wonders how many singular minutes it would take Nyanko-sensei to hunt them down and steal it back. He wishes his cat was here with him instead of suffering Taki’s affections, wherever they were. 

It still hasn’t truly occurred to Takashi that he’s in trouble, here; he’s seen scarier things than three thieves. He’s seen scarier people. The family he lived with when he was seven were worse than any ayakashi he’s ever met. 

“Let’s see what’s in your bag, sweetheart,” the man closest to him says, and reaches for the strap of the satchel hanging over his shoulder. 

A bell rings, shrill and insistent. Takashi blinks as the men swear and dive to one side of the street to make way for a bike hurtling in their direction. 

Tanuma’s on the bike, peddling furiously. Nyanko-sensei is in the basket. Takashi stares as Tanuma hits the brakes and swings the bike around in a sharp one-eighty, and the only thing he can think to say is, “We came here on the train. Where did you get this bike?”

“Natsume,” Tanuma pants, exasperated, “just get on.”

“Ah. Right.”

He swings a leg over the extended seat, finding the passenger pegs with his feet and curling an arm around Tanuma’s middle. Secures the strap of his bag over his chest with his free hand, and glances at the strangers for the split-second it takes Tanuma to get them moving again. 

They look as dumb-founded by the last ten seconds as they probably should, picking themselves up off the asphalt. They don’t seem willing to chase two teenagers on a bicycle, and Takashi watches them until Tanuma takes a corner at a breakneck pace and throws those men out of sight. 

It takes two city blocks for Tanuma to slow down. Takashi leans forward, pressing his cheek to Tanuma’s back, and feels his heart racing. 

“Don’t overexert yourself,” he says, the admonishment made gentle by a brief squeeze of his arms around Tanuma’s waist. “Think of how much Nishimura will tease you if we have to carry you back to the ryokan.”

“Think of how long Kitamoto is going to scold you when I tell him what just happened,” Tanuma retorts. He’s winded, shoulders heaving, but his voice steadies the longer he talks. “What were you thinking, Natsume? Just standing there?”

Takashi doesn’t lift his head, remaining pillowed against Tanuma’s back while they wait for a light to change at the crosswalk. He can’t think of anything else to say, so he decides on the truth.

“I guess I’m used to monsters,” he says. “I forget there are regular people to watch out for, too.”

At the front of the bike, Nyanko-sensei harrumphs and mutters a comment that sounds derisive, but Takashi can’t hear him very well from where he’s sitting. If he were actually angry, he’d make sure Takashi could hear him. 

The light changes. The bike tips a little as Tanuma pushes it upright and starts pedaling again. 

Tanuma says, “Good thing I’m here, then.”

“Mm,” Takashi agrees warmly, tucking a smile away against his boyfriend’s shoulder. “Tanuma?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you steal this bike?”

They swerve dangerously; a car honks, and Nyanko-sensei squawks in alarm. Tanuma wrangles them back under control, sputtering, “I did not  _steal_ it, I  _borrowed_ it– I’m– we’re putting it back right now– and it was Nishimura’s idea! You just  _disappeared_ , Natsume! I had to find you!”

Takashi laughs breathlessly, his heart racing in a way that has nothing to do with any danger, and holds on tight. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> talk to me on [tumblr](taizi.tumblr.com) !


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